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Description

Bringing a new dimension to the study of citizenship, Chinese Citizenship examines how individuals at the margins of Chinese society deal with state efforts to transform them into model citizens in the late 1990s and early 2000s.

Based on extensive original research, the authors argue that social and cultural citizenship has a greater impact on people’s lives than legal, civil and political citizenship. The seven case studies present intimate portraits of the conflicted identities of peasants, criminals, ethnic minorities, the urban poor, rural migrant children in the cities, mainland migrants in Hong Kong and Chinese youth studying abroad, as they negotiate the perilous dilemmas presented by globalization and neoliberalism.

Drawing on a diverse array of theories and methods from anthropology, sociology, education, political science, cultural studies and development studies, the book presents fresh perspectives and highlights the often devastating consequences that citizenship distinctions can have on Chinese lives.

Reviews

'This volume provides fresh insights into some fascinating questions. Through a wide assortment of rich case studies, its sheds new light on current understandings of changing, contested, and often conflictual conceptions of citizenship in the post-Mao period.' - China Journal

'In sum, the authors not only provide detailed information about neglected but important subjects, but also leave the reader with ample food for thought about the quest for modernity and prosperity both in China, and around the world.'

-China Journal

'This edited volume of papers from a conference at Cambridge University fills a notable gap in addressing citizenship in China from the perspective of those at the margins of society, exploring particularly the question of how "cutural citizenship" conditions access to social goods…With its focus on those struggling to keep up in China's rush to "modernity," the Fong and Murphy book points toward stimulating new directions for further research on citizenship.'- Sophia Woodman, Pacific Affairs, Vol. 80, No. 3, Fall 2007

Contents

Introduction: Chinese Experiences of Citizenship at the Margins 2. Citizenship Education in Rural China: the Dispositional and Technical Training of Cadres and Farmers 3. The Urban Chinese Educational System and the Marginality of Migrant Children 4. Choosing Between Ethnic and Chinese Citizenship: The Educational Trajectories of Tibetan Minority Children in Northwestern China 5. Legal Report: Citizenship Education through a Television Documentary 6. Civilizing Shanghai: Government Efforts to Cultivate Citizenship Among Impoverished Residents 7. Teaching ‘Responsibility’: Social Workers’ Efforts to Turn Chinese Immigrants Into Ideal Hong Kong Citizens 8. Chinese Youth Between the Margins of China and the First World

Author Bio

Vanessa L. Fong is an Assistant Professor in the Graduate School of Education at Harvard University. Her publications include Only Hope: Coming of Age under China's One-Child Policy (Stanford University Press, 2004), Women in Republican China (co-edited with Hua R. Lan, M.E. Sharpe, 1999), and articles on identity, nationalism, globalization, gender and population in China.

Rachel Murphy is a research fellow in the Contemporary Chinese Studies Programme and Pembroke College, University of Oxford. Her publications include How Migrant Labour is Changing Rural China (Cambridge University Press, 2002) and articles on rural development, entrepreneurship, education, gender and population in China.

Related Subjects

Name: Chinese Citizenship: Views from the Margins (Paperback) – Routledge
Description: Edited by Vanessa L. Fong, Rachel Murphy. Bringing a new dimension to the study of citizenship, Chinese Citizenship examines how individuals at the margins of Chinese society deal with state efforts to transform them into model citizens in the late 1990s and early 2000s.
Based on extensive...
Categories: Political Sociology, Chinese Studies, Chinese Culture & Society, Chinese Politics, Chinese Politics